>> next, the commanders of the u.s. strategic cybercommands talked about the spending cuts and what it could impact as far as security goes. general robert shapiro and keith alexander took questions. this is two hours and 45 minutes. >> today we received testimony

from the u.s. strategic command and the u.s. cybercommand. let us welcome the two generals. i thank them both. we thank you for your great work. we thank you and we hope that you will pass along your thanks to those who work with you. we greatly appreciate all the service. this hearing comes at a time when the department of defense and other federal agencies face the twin threat of sequestration. and an expiring continuing revolution. we want to hear from eyewitnesses what impact budget restrictions and uncertainty are likely to have on their programs and operations over the coming months. first, the general hear some of the issues that we hope to address this morning.

>> thank you, the status of our nuclear deterrence, and are we satisfied with the ability to maintain our nuclear stockpile so that we can ensure without test that this meet military requirements. to protect our space assets and that constitute them, and nature of space. the lead combatant command is stratcom. how concerned are you in preserving this block of spectrum, given the competing pressure to allocate spectrum towards commercial use and finally, what is your view on

the links between the space and cyberdomains and the potential for integration of capabilities and operations in both domains. now, relative to the cybercommand. especially since the department proposed to establish a cybercommand, the armed services committee has emphasized a lack of policy, strategy, rules of engagement, roles and missions and command and control arrangements. it is critical to managing this vital and complex domain. progress has been slower in syria than we have desired. after congress failed to pass comprehensive security legislation, the president developed an issue of executive order aimed at improving the security of infrastructure and to share cyberthreat information

better. the president has also issued a classified presidential policy director the department of defense looking through the planning process has developed a set of emergency action procedures. the joint staff is ready to issue its first-ever document covering cyberdoctrine. finally, we understand that the joint staff states that will soon issue rules of engagement from military commanders. the fact that these foundational policy frameworks and planning actions are not just taking shape, it serves as a stark illustration of how immature and complex this warfare domain

remains. the national defense authorization act for fiscal year 2013 included a sense of congress provision that raised serious concerns about complications that could be caused by making cybercommand a full unified command. the nba also included a provision that requires the secretary of defense to create a process for a designated defense contractor to reported department when networks successfully penetrated. we are interested in hearing the views of our people in that regard. meanwhile, china's technology to steal business strategy through

cyberspace continues limitlessly. lester's report by the national counterintelligence executive, plus a recent report in the very reason cyberintelligence leaves little doubt that china's actions are a serious threat to our nation's economic well-being and to our security. it is long past time that the united states and our allies released a study in january that provides a grim assessment and the owners of critical infrastructure. in light of vulnerabilities, highlighted in that report, the

science board suggests building resilience into our forces and infrastructure in addition to trying to improve defenses. we look forward to hearing from general alexander from preventing adversaries from damaging our critical infrastructure. we have a long way to go to protect our vital infrastructure from damaging attacks. that is why i supported the lieberman and collins bill that the senate did not pass. we are deeply concerned about this issue and looked working together to try to address china in that area. >> thank you, mr. chairman.

>> is a very significant hearing and i want to thank both of you. you have helped me along the importance of our nuclear forces make clear this committee. we try to protect the nuclear capabilities to the maximum extent possible and the nuclear deterrence are the last thing that you want to do serious damage to it is troubling to

general kehler. reduced readiness and curtail quantitation will damage the perceived capability, especially in and shared objective. you're exactly right. i'm glad you made that very bold statement. in other words, if we don't consistently demonstrated commitment that deterrence, both in words and in funding, our allies might be compromised in the nuclear umbrella. they could be leave that they have a nuclear advantage of the united states, which i think that gap is closing.

although the president has been awol over the issue, on the cyberend of it, i'm skipping a lot of my opening statements. we have failed to have them implement a strategic strategy and not a day goes by where it is not reported that our national security is being exploited in the cyberdomain. and nation states such as iran and china. they have been exposed publicly for attempting to gain access to undermine our defense and economic and criminal terrorist organizations continue to

actively pursue and exploit bush's capabilities with little resistance or consequences. despite my concern on white house policy, the department is beginning to rise above the gridlock that is thought to underline the pentagon's reach. i'm happy to applaud general alexander for him and his team and what they have accomplished in developing the foundation necessary and i will talk about the conversation you and i had. my concern over the future is to make sure that you are there long enough to understand the complicated issue. certainly more must be done in the resources must be allocated.

i am pleased to see the defense only mindset. i think we need to get beyond that so we can understand that. it is going to have to be pursued. so under the sequester, every department will be subject to the highest level of scrutiny. the threats we face are lined and are emboldened by her dysfunction. every dollar we spend should be maximized and those going towards nuclear deterrence and missile defense and cyber. that is what is the most significant part of the hearing today. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, editor and hot. general kehler? >> i would like to make my full statement for the record, please. >> yes.

>> it is a privilege to begin my third year of leaving the outstanding men and women of the strategic command. i am also pleased to be here with general keith alexander as the chief of cybercommand and the national security agency cover some of the most national security subjects. the general alexander and i are greatly valuing his leadership and his counsel. uncertainty and complexity continue to dominate the national security landscape even as the united states transitions from a decade of active conflict in southwest asia. many have remained volatile, and regional issues can quickly have global consequences. it validates this perspective. since my last appearance before the committee, we have seen violent extremists continue to

act against u.s. intellectual property, institutions and critical infrastructure. we are adding unique challenges. not only is the initial sequestration reduction taking place, but it allows little flexibility and we are working from a continuing resolution while the services are continuing. threats in space and cyberspace are increasing and the

possibility of nuclear proliferation persists. potential enemies are watching and in the world, stratcom remains protecting our national security interests and my priority support this focus. or and we aspire to achieve the capabilities to create detail in effect the nation needs. our primary objective is to prevent conflict by influencing an advanced the decisions of those who would consider threatening our vital national interests.

while i heritage and strategic command is nuclear and our nuclear goodlettsville once will never waver is far more versatile than ever before. given the potential impact defining resources could have on stratcom, i am concerned that i may not be able to say the same in six months or a year from now. i am most concerned with the impact financial uncertainty is having on our people. uniform and nonuniform members alike have managed the effect of combat deployment and operational risk. it take personal risks for the country, but they are phil friel of taking financial risks for their family.

by the way, civilians comprise about 60% of the stratcom headquarters staff. they hold key leadership positions and represent critical expertise because they are such dedicated patriots, i believe that we will cope with the effects of financial uncertainty in the near term. but i do worry that our best experience people will leave early and the young people and stay as long. sequestration will eventually impact the command's readiness and curtail growth in new areas like cyberdefense. even though the services are trying to give stratcom missions rorty treatment as much as possible within the law, you heard that from deputy secretary carter last month, we cannot remain immune. while the immediate impact will vary by command, overall in

stratcom come, the effect is a bit like an avalanche. we will see greater impact and potential impacts as senator inhofe mentioned. in both space and cyberspace and to our support to those around the globe. in the longer term, continuing this financial path will affect long-term sustainment needs, eliminating or jeopardizing a number of important recapitalization efforts. of course, ultimately such reductions could impact our ability to deter and assure. mr. chairman, stratcom's responsibilities have not changed, but the way we must carry them out has been drastically changed since a year ago. we hope to meet our mission responsibilities today. but the pathway we are on is

creating risk and our ability to execute it. i look forward to working with the committee in congress on these difficult and complex challenges and i will carry back your message of appreciation for the men and women that we are privileged to associate with and i look forward to your questions. >> thank you, general kehler. general alexander? >> thank you, chairman carl levin and the ranking member and members of congress. it is a tremendous honor to work with and for general bob kehler. he has been so supportive of everything that we are trying to do and cybercommand. he is the only one that is nice to me and an intelligence officer. [laughter] you know, eight gives me great pleasure to talk about great things we're doing we are doing and cybercommand and address some of these questions that you put on the table. i will try to answer some of them. i cannot answer all of them

today. the role of the defense department, as you know it takes a team to operate as an we have talked about the approach. but at times, we have talked about who is in charge when we are not clear on that. when defending the nation when it's under attack, that is a defense department mission. that falls to the u.s. cybercommand and cyberspace. we are also responsible for the combatant commands and cyberspace operations and defending the defense department networks as well as supporting dhs in defending critical of the structure. we must also gather important information to protect and prevent and mitigate and recover from cyberincidents in the support of dhs and the fbi. no private entity has all the required authorities, resources, capabilities to prevent a serious cyberattack.

i work closely with secretary napolitano and bob mueller of the fbi. we all see eye to eye on the importance of supporting each other in these cybermissions. the fbi's role is absolutely critical from disrupting cybercriminals and leading investigations. the work of dhs to defend the government and strengthen the security posture of critical and the structure is essential. they are the reason for domestic cybersecurity and protect networks and critical infrastructure. to act quickly, we must have clear ways of responsibility and rules of engagement. we recognize that the private sector plays a key role in this and having the ability to work with the private sector is absolutely important to us. one of the key reasons that we need cyberlegislation. the del issued, as you noted, is

a step in the right direction. we take cybercommand sincerely to heart and ensure that we do every part of this properly. i would also point out that we can do both. you can protect civil liberties and our nation and cyberspace. i think that is one of the things that need to educate the american people on. how do we get our? how we work with industry to do this? if you look at the strategic landscape, you have hit on much of that, mr. chairman. when you look at the landscape from our perspective, it is getting worse. the cyberattacks are growing and we see the attacks on wall street over the last six months grow significantly.

over 140 of those attacks of the last six months, last summer in august we saw a destructive attack where the data on over 30,000 systems were destroyed. if you look at industries, especially the antivirus community and others, they believe that it is going to grow more in 2013. there is a lot that we need to do to prepare for this. let me just talk a little bit about what we are doing to prepare for my perspective. as many of you know, we are already developing a the team that we need, the tactics and the doctrine for how these teams shall be employed, with a focus on defending the nation in cyberspace. i would like to be clear that this team is not a defensive team, it is a team at the defense department would use to defend the nation if it were attacked and cyberspace.

thirteen of the teams we are creating a for that mission that alone. we are also creating 27 teams that will support combatant command and the planning process with cybercapabilities. then we have a series of teams that will defend our networks and cyberspace. those three that teams are the core contract of what we are working with and the services. the key here is training our folks to the highest standard possible. i think that that is the most important thing that we are on the road to and it is the most important partnership that we have had with nsa and others in ensuring that the savings that we have for our folks is the highest level. getting on a few key points that we are doing to develop the cyberstrategy. you have mentioned command and control. general kehler, we thank you for

how you work with cybercommand and how we push information back and forth in how and how we have operational control and direct support and teams operating in that area. one of the key things that we must address is how do we see attacks in cyberspace. today, seeing that attack is almost impossible for the defense department, specifically an attack on wall street that will probably not be seen by us. it will be seen by the private sector first. that is a key need for information sharing. it has to be real-time to the defense department, the department of homeland security, and the fbi, all at the same time. one government team. if we are going to respond in time to make a difference, we have to see that in real time. those companies are sharing that information with us have to have

liability protections. we are also building the operational picture that cybercommand would share with dhs and the fbi and other national leaders. we need joint information environment and security. not only is that more defensible, it was created by some of our folks to come up with the most defensible architecture we could make. it is also more care. it is not perfect. no architecture is perfect, but it is better than what we are and it is cheaper and something we should push for. chairman, you mentioned authorities and policies and we are working that hard. this is a new area for our folks, especially within congress and the american people, those who are being cautious in ensuring that we are doing it exactly right in

sharing information we have with congress. in conclusion, from my perspective, no one person is to blame for our current preparedness and cyberspace. many don't understand the serious threat that it is, so we need to educate people on the threat the u.s. has made significant strides for cyberdoctrine, organizing cybercapabilities and building cybercapacities and capabilities continue to evolve faster than our own. >> thank you, we will have an eight minute first round.

general kehler, we will start with you. a report was released in january that has a number of noteworthy assertions and i would like to start with this assertion. the report says that our nuclear deterrent is regularly evaluated for reliability and readiness. however most of the systems have not been assessed against a sophisticated cyberattack to understand possible weak spots. can you comment on our? general alexander, i would like you to comment on that as well. >> mr. chairman, in general terms, i agree with the report. i think that they have pointed out a number of places in which we need to do better. let me home and specifically on the command and control system for just a moment. much of the system today is the

legacy system that we have had in some ways that help us. in some cases it is point-to-point hard wire. we are very concerned with the potential of cyberrelated attacks. in terms of an end-to-end comprehensive review, i think that that is difficult for us to accomplish. and what we have done up to date, and the pieces that we have looked at today come which has been going on for quite some time, i am confident that today the nuclear command and control system and nuclear weapons platforms themselves do not have a significant vulnerability that would cause me to be concerned.

we don't know what we don't know. we need a new way to evaluate such a threat. i'm in agreement with him. most importantly, we are concerned of something that would disconnect our mission from going forward or disconnect the president from going forward. we have done a lot more over the last one or two years, but i think that in general terms, the defense board is right that we need to do better at exercising such threats and we need to do better working with keith and his team to detect such threats. we have a ways to go before we can put a punctuation mark at

the end of the sentence. >> the pace of those things has increased and we have completed an intercontinental ballistic missile system. and we have confident this is something that we will need to increase the volume of the game here. >> general alexander, would you like to add anything to that? >> first, general kehler has led a series of meetings on the nsa side and to look out vulnerabilities and address those. i will tell you that they have done a great job over the last six months in doing that. and i think that that has moved in the right direction and reached the conclusioconclusio n that the general gist day. i would also add that our

infrastructure, it is one of the sources of concern. we can have independent routes, but it complicates our missions. and it gets back to the cyberrealm of how the government and industry work together to ensure the viability of those portions of our critical of the structure. >> general alexander, there is a real theft going on in our business strategies and intellectual property, by china, and the question is, -- i guess the real question is whether

intelligence community can determine what companies in china may be receiving that intellectual property to compete against u.s. firms? >> i would say that the intelligence community has increased this significantly over the last seven years and i can give you specific examples in a classified setting. this has to stop. we have to find a way of preventing it, stopping it, in every way that we can, this is a threat someday could be a

physical and military threat as well. we will take that in a classified setting. >> you mentioned three teams, is there a timetable for that? >> the intent is to roughly have one third of those from the first third by the end of september of next year, and the final third and i will tell you that they are pushing that faster. the key part of that is training and i am extremely proud of the rate that they are pushing. >> general, you mentioned the executive order and you have indicated that the information sharing is needed in real-time. please give us your personal

view as to why congress needs to pass the cyberlegislation and what needs to be in their? what is missing now that needs to be in legislation, which congress hopefully will pass. >> first, the inability for the isp to tell us, when they see an attack started, they can do that in technical capabilities and network speed. how do we get that network to a more defensible state. it is like your own personal computer. how do we set the standards without being overly

bureaucratic but how do we set the standard so that the power grid can withstand cyberexploits and attack allowing us to sit down with different sectors of industry and allow us to check out how we move through the regulatory process. >> and you talk about the authority that you share.

is this a privacy piece of that? >> chairman, it is important for them to share information on networks to the government. >> that is a secret of proprietary information issue? >> in combination, i think he it goes to some of the previous acts that have been. i think that what we have to do is tell them it is okay to share this level of information with the government. specifically from our perspective, it is an exploit attack is coming and when the government shares back signatures, it becomes complicated because some of our capabilities are classified.

we have to have a way of giving unclassified information and then if they see that classified information, think of this as going up to new york city on the new jersey turnpike. it would see a car going by, they sought a significant effect, going from this internet address to the target address make it tell us that that network speed, they can stop the traffic. government cannot scale with the providers can do. it will be very costly and very inefficient.

we are not asking for contact, we are asking for implementation about threats. >> classified information is required to report threats to the government and regulations and rules for that are currently being written. >> the industrial base and the threat that we see, the threat of the men men long before. so i think we need a total approach. that is a good step in the right direction.

>> general kehler, there seems to be unanimity in the relationship between the nuclear reductions and nuclear modernization. secretary gates said when we have more confidence in the weapon system, ability to reduce the number of weapons we must keep. do you agree with that? and with the linkage in general that i'm referring to? >> yes, i do. taking that last statement, is there reason to believe that we are and you now have more confidence? how we earn that competence with the existing system? >> sir, i am confident in the stockpile that provides the sustainment in the hedge against any technical failure that might

experience. every year the commander of my predecessor, i am responsible to provide an assessment of the stockpile. >> you have had the resources can you meet her expectations into ours? >> the resources over the last couple of years have helped us. resources have dwindled to an unacceptable point. >> i'm referring to the number of ground-based interceptors going down under this administration from 44 up to 30. it's really more than i because there are 10 of them that would've been part of the ground-based interceptor, which

was the protection of the event until eastern united states. the statement was made where you have a radar system and agree what is necessary for you ground-based interceptor, but you won't pull the rug out from under us. and of course, i said yes, that we did anyway. now we are looking at where we are today. i would ask, do you think we should, are we satisfied with the numbers that we have gone down to in terms of our ground-based interceptors. are you satisfied with the

numbers? >> i am satisfied the can defend against this today and i think that i am confident that we can defend against a limited attack from iran, although we are not in the most awesome posture to do this. >> i think you're being a little too cautious. when he saved limited we have optional ground-based interceptors are really to enhance our capability.

i am concerned, as i have always been, going all the way back to the polling operation, was what was going to happen as far as the east coast of the united states. we are somewhat confident. how would you characterize confidence in the eastern part of the country with the capability that we have today. >> when you talk about this, the data that we can currently expect, it had the capability

that is concerned about in 2015 these terms. can you do that for me? >> yes, sir. >> let's see here. let's go to general alexander. first of all, you have been very helpful to me and bringing to my attention some of the things and shortfalls of my knowledge while it could be considered a relic of the 80s and 90s, they are

still integral to our core infrastructure and have unique security vulnerabilities. do you agree that defenses are essential and that the efforts must be made to ensure our mainstreams receive comparable attention on the vulnerability of protection? it seems to me that most of the focus is where all of the data is stored. all of the new stuff that is coming on, are we adequately protecting the mainstream mainframe components of our system? been senator, as we discussed i believe there is more work that needs to be done. that portion of the total information infrastructure, it is not the only vulnerability in

the most frequent that we see. as you stated, it is one of the ones that we don't normally look at. but it is one that our folks are addressing and one that is key to it later defense. >> what you hear is the new systems coming on more than the mainframe. >> financial firms have spent millions of dollars trying to

[inaudible] officials say the topic was at high-level white house meetings -- they said that all options are on the table. >> this gets to the heart of how do we defend the country and when does the defense department stepped in to defend the country and what are the actions of the isp's can do? what is the most logical approach to this? when i say logical, those are what are mainly hitting wall street today. those types of attacks are

probably at the nuisance level mitigated by the internet service providers that is the work that the administration is going to highlight. in order to do that, it gets back to the question the german had asked about information sharing. for us to stop at networks become we have to see that network speed and we have to know that this is key. i do see that this is a growing problem. i believe this is one of the problems with the antivirus community would see in 2013. >> i appreciate that. i have been concerned about our eyes losing confidence in the strength of our umbrella that is other like to have you, as we

all remember, during the start makkah treaty, the president was very specific on the things he was going to do. with specific weapons, this was all put back during the treaty. for the record i would like to have you evaluate what we have done and what we should have done and we were told was going to be done if that treaty would pass. >> yes, sir, i will. >> sir? >> thank you, general, for your service. general, in your discussions, you talked about was standing a limited attack with a country like martha ran.

with a country like north korea or iran. now they have limited attack and are we capable of defending them today against what they have and at what point do feel we could go beyond a limited attack [inaudible] >> in some cases, other u.s. territories, the second question

is about limited threat to the united states and the current ballistic missile defense system is limited in two important ways. number one, in terms of the size and the technological capability of it. there are a certain number of ballistic missiles. given the potential progress we are seeing from them, we are deciding what steps we can take additionally we are working with

the intelligence community on that to see if we can scope that. one aspect is a replacement of the ballistic missile submarine in the ohio class. can you give us an assessment of what we can allow, additional slippage -- or can we not get along without? >> we must get on with the replacement. i think it continues to serve us well. as far as we can see into the

future, i think we will require a replacement for the ohio class. here's the interesting part, they will read to date that they are no longer being used witty or use today. to make sure we understand the time with clarity and we keep the submarines any longer than any other sufferings that we had before. i think we will reach a point that we must have a replacement. i believe that we understand where that point is and the current program is important. >> thank you. >> the electric grid is one of the major ways that we are concerned about.

>> depends on the local grid that could be taken down. [inaudible] >> sir, that nuclear force was designed to operate to the most extreme of circumstances we could possibly imagine. so i am not concerned that a disruption in the power grid that would disrupt our ability to use that force of the president of her toes the reason to use that. i am concerned about the electric magnetic pulse. any kind of electromagnetic interference. we need to be mindful of

potential disruptions to the force. but i'm not concerned about disruptions to the power grid, for example, or other critical of the structure pieces impacting not forced. >> general, your comments about this? >> sir, i agree with what the general has said. nuclear command and control, what weight we do not specifically. what it really impacts his commands like trams, and others and our ability to communicate would be significantly reduced. and it would complicate our governance and our ability for the government to act. i think what general taylor has would be in tact. the consequence of that is the cascading effect into operating that kind of environment that concerns us and concerns me. >> okay, let me raise an issue as the senator indicated. it's easy, senator carl levin.

the legislation was not successful. it is very important. right now we have involuntary scheme. one of the arguments that is raised by the opponents is that of imposing too much cost on the business community and etc. your knowledge of the potential state and nonstate ability to disrupt the economy of the united states, not our strategic commands, but atm machines and etc. have you done a calculation of the potential cost of the economy, if someone decided to conduct an intimate attack on our banking system -- and concentrated attack? >> senator, an attack on our bank would be significant. it would have significant impact. if people can't get to their money, the impact of that is huge and you have seen that.

we have discussed that. >> yes, we have. >> what i am concerned about is a service attack can accomplish that. it could make it very difficult for people to do online banking and trading and others. so there is a cost if you think about losing amazon, one hour cost $7 million in profit to them. and there is also a cost to accomplish its legislation in that each of our critical infrastructure portions of our industry have different levels of cyberreadiness, if you will. so the banks and the internet service providers are generally pretty good. the power companies are not so good and the government is somewhere in between. so the cost for fixing that is significant. i think the issues that i get talkative in the street is there concern on creating an over bureaucratic regulatory process.

.. now, the probability has to be weighed, but this -- that today is 1%. that might be reasonable judgment, but i think the impression i get from your testimony and consistently is that percentage or probability goes up and up and up with each day, so we reached the point where -- do the math -- and if

we are not investing in protecting themselves, these financial decisions have the likeness to be catastrophic. it all seem to get the point been. >> i don't think that's accurate. increases every day. as the concern. you seen that from an industry standpoint. and saudi think we have to have this public debate. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. wanted thank those of our witnesses for their leader and service to our country. wanted to follow-up, general kehler, the issue of the intercontinental ballistic missile threat to the country that the senators asked about. he used that term -- i think you said not optimum in terms of some of the challenges that we may face there.

just so it's clear to people, if now -- is an icy and were headed to the west coast we would get a shoot look shoot at it, correct and because of our missile defense system? but we don't have an east coast missile defense system. so if the development of a ballistic missile capability and we did not have the same capacity on the status of the country? >> i hate to say the answer is it depends. it depends on what a country would do, whether it would launch from, what the assets are the intent is that as time passes and additional features are added to the ballistic missile defense system that our capability to defend it improves >> but just so we're clear, as of today, am i not correct in saying that the west coast, north korea we did should look shoot. we don't get the same capacity

on the east coast -- some analysts believe they could develop this icbm capability as soon as 2015. that may or may not be correct, but at this point our missile defense is the capacity is different and the east coast versus the west coast, is that true? >> i was to -- i would tentatively say yes and provide you a better answer for the record. >> i appreciate it because the national research council actually this year recommended an additional ballistic missile site on the east coast, isn't that right? >> yes. that was -- there one of the organizations that has looked at this. >> i certainly would like to hear your view more specifically as to why in east coast missile defense side would or would not enhance our capability to address a icbm missile. >> i be happy -- >> particularly protecting the population base on the east coast of the country. >> to be happy to provide that for the record. >> thank you, general.

wanted to follow-up, as i understand it last week you testified in the house armed services committee that any potential future nuclear arms reductions with the russians should be bilateral nature, is that fair? >> that's fair. >> my follow-up question to that is, should they not be bilateral and verifiable? is verifiable important if we were going to take of arms reduction based on what we were going to count on the bilateral understanding with the russians? >> i believe verifiable as important. >> why is a critical are important and we think about entering these types of the understandings with the russians? or any other country for that matter with regard to nuclear arms. >> senator, from a military perspective i believe we have been on a successful and the libera pathway with the russians that has allowed us to reduce

the threat to the american people and to our allies while at the same time being able to achieve our national security objectives, and we have done so in a way that is verifiable. i think that is a winning combination of things. verification has been important from an insurance standpoint. think it's important it. it has also provided second and third order benefits in terms of transparency and engagement with russia which i think has been valuable. >> general, the russians in full compliance with all existing arms control agreements with the ad states right now? >> the united states view is that they are not in compliance with the conventional forces. >> are there any other treaty obligations there not in compliance with? >> as i recall -- i will provide the official answer for the record. there are a couple of other trees are we have questions about the way they're going about it.

the only one that we have said that we do not believe the officially that they are complying with this conventional forces in europe. i can tell you that so forehoof under new start all the implications that i have is that they are employed compliant >> i would like an answer. >> of provide that for the record. >> you and i talked about this. an article that appeared in the sunday new york times titled cuts give a obama path to leaner military. in that article the article essentially said that it would give the administration the sequestration cuts that allows the administration to call for deep reductions in programs long in president obama's sites, and

among those programs were an additional reduction in deployed nuclear weapons and stockpiles and a restructuring -- there is other restructuring, but the issue of want to ask about is an additional reduction in deployed nuclear weapons. can you tell me right now in the article the joint chiefs agreed we could trim the number of active nuclear-weapons in america's arsenal by nearly one-third and made big cuts and stockpile and back up weapons. is there any intention by the administration right now that you're aware of or any recommendation pending to significantly reduce our active nuclear weapon arsenal by one-third or make take -- make big cuts in the stockpile of our backup weapons as outlined in this article? >> senator, i cannot comment on the article. what i can say is, from the nuclear posture review forward,

certainly the administration has undertaken a study to look at what alternatives may exist beyond reductions fur a new k-9. we did parts of the study. we were fully involved. to my knowledge no decisions have been made. >> let me just say that obviously i think that preserving our nuclear deterrent is very, very important. i think that making significant reductions right now at a time with the fate -- the threat we face in the situation where we find ourselves, i think, and the world that obviously i hope that if there are any reductions that are made, for example, with the russians that that would be done through the treaty process. that the new s.t.a.r.t. would be done through a treaty process, and one of the things this

article also says is there could be reductions may with the russians without a treaty. i don't know whether you all would weigh in on whether we should go through the tree process, but in my view i think that congress should have an ability to weigh in on these issues. i wanted to ask you, general alexander, the role of the garden cyber issues, were d.c. the guard in general, not just the air national guard, but all of the guard playing what role they would play in regard to how we meet the challenges facing us the cyber attacks and what role could the guard play on a state basis working with your -- obviously you, general kehler and general alexander, and how in the guard help in this? >> thank you, senator. i have sat down with the guard leaders, all of the generals from all the guard and talked about the role and responsibility of the guard in

cyberspace, and i think there are two key things that they can do. first, by setting a protection platoons and teams and turning into the same standards it gives us additional capacity that we may need in a cyber conflict. the second part is that also providing us with an ability to work with the state's with a joint terrorism task force and cyber force is that the fbi has with vhs to provide additional technical capacity for resilience and recovery in the think in those two areas the guard can play a huge role. the key is turning into the same standards. we talked about that with all the guard chiefs. they agree with that. we are working toward that objective. >> thank you both. i appreciate it. >> thank you, senator. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general kehler, you spoke very crisply about us having the ability in our command and

control to control our nuclear response. i appreciate that. that is a sharing, even though we might have a the cyber attacks that would take out electric grids and so forth. what about the russians and chinese? did they have the ability to stop some cyber attack from launching one of their nuclear icbm? >> senator, i don't know. what -- i do not know. >> well, mr. chairman, i think -- i think that is a question that we ought to see to what degree we could answer. that reminds me, you know, in the disintegration of the soviet union, it was the united states

that took the initiative to go in and try to secure those nuclear weapons. that turned out to be a very successful program. in this new world of cyber threats we, of course, have to be responsible for hours, but we have to worry about those others on the planet that have a nuclear strike capability of protecting theirs against some outside player coming in and suddenly taking over their command and control. general alexander, do you have any comment? >> i wonder if you would yield the floor with his answer. >> certainly. >> a very important question. for starters -- i did not mean to interrupt the answer -- as to whether for starters, senator

nelson, we should ask the intelligence community at large as to what we know about that. >> okay. if you want to say that -- >> no. no. we will do that. it's a great idea, important point, and we will take and on. we will ask that we not interrupt for the the answer. >> okay. i no general alexander will be constrained as what he can say in this setting. let me just for that for a classified setting. >> not just classified, but also broader intelligence community assessment as well if we could. >> general alexander knows everything about everything. [laughter] >> senator, if i could add just one additional point, i would say that we know -- i think, because we have worked with the russians over the years and we have had fairly decent

transparency with the russians over the years, i think we understand, they are very careful about their nuclear command and control. they're very careful about the way provide what we would call nuclear shirty as well. this is also one of the reasons for why we would like to see additional transparency with china because we would like to be able to have these dialogues with them in a military to military kind of context in something that we have been trying to push for quite some time. >> exactly. and as we go into the session that the chairman is recommended , let's just don't stop with china. what about the brits, the french , do they have the capabilities of stopping a cyber -- aerobes cyber attack from coming in and suddenly messing up their command and control? general alexander, you must be

one of the most frustrated people on the planet because you know the threat in cyber. here the congress cannot get anything done because of certain players not allowing the passage of legislation. let me ask you, what is it about liability protection that the private sector would feel comfortable about in order so that real time, as you said, we have to have the private side -- private sector respond to an attack with the information in real time and ordered to be able to meet this present in the increasingly dangerous threat?

>> i give you my answer and ask that you just take that for the record to give you accurate and detailed answers because i do think this is important to lay this out. the issues as i see it for liability protection are in two parts. when the internet service providers and companies are acting as an agent of the government and making subject to lawsuits the issue becomes they get sued so many times by so many different actors that they spend a lot of money and time and effort responding to those lawsuits when we have asked them to do something to defend the nation. there is now one. the other is, let's say directly that we send a signature that says, stop this piece of traffic because it is that a virus that hit saudi aramco. we miss characterize. when they stop it and stop some traffic that they did not intend to, nor did we. mistakes are going to happen

because when you have real-time concerns, emergency concerns some traffic may be impacted. that traffic that is impacted, the a chat service providers were quickly fix by altering the signature to get it right. but some traffic has been delayed or disrupted by their actions because we have asked them to, which could cause them also to be subject to lawsuits. it is in that bin you that we have to give them immunity from those kinds of actions and not talking a lot giving them broad general immunity, and i don't think anyone is when a judgment -- when dealing with the government in good faith, we should protect them for what we're asking them to do i think that is why of -- luggage you a more specific answer from legal folks on the technical side. >> this should not be that hard because we have been through this before. the data on all the questions a few years ago of being able to intercept traffic in order to

identify the terrorists, wherever there were. clearly we have dealt with before in liability protection, so we ought to be able to get this one. >> i think, senator, if i may, there is broad consensus on information sharing and liability protection. where it really gets uncomfortable, if you will, is regulation standards, what the government does there. that is the really hard part. in part because all of the industry sectors are so different. i think that is one of the things that the administration has done that really puts this forward, the executive order now gives us an avenue to start discussing that. i think that is useful. any legislation should point to that and look at incentives to industry and others to have a more resilient infrastructure.

>> thank you. >> thanks, mr. chairman. >> thank you. thank you, senator nelson. now it is cinder blocks. >> thank you, chairman. general alexander, on the staffing of cyber command, it has been reported that you need to expand in a significant way. talk a little bit about what you see as your staffing needs and also how you would meet those staffing needs, how do you compete for the kind of people you need better in the private sector now? >> senator, thank you. there are two issues here. let me just pull them apart to accurately answer questions. we're not talking about significantly increasing the cyber command staff. we are actually asking the service components of summer command to field teams that can do three missions : defend the

nation from attack, support our combat commanders, and defend our networks with cyber protection plans. those sets of teams are what is the big growth we're talking about. the services that we are looking at. we aren't working closely with each of the services in setting standards, training standards for those. the good news, so far the services of stand-up and met every goal the we have put before them and i give my hat's off to the service chiefs in giving an. so we are right now in line, on track for one-third of that being completed by september. about one-third by next september, 2014, and the last third by 2015. the good news is we are taking the most serious threats and addressing those first with the teams that have already been stood up. they are already online and actively working in this field to muscle we already have teams up and running.

thanks to the army, air force, navy for setting this teams up. what we're talking about is bringing those folks and. doing that. there are two parts. one is training, so we can take the kids, young adults with great aptitude. it'll have to be cyber experts. we can help them get there. my experiences people who want to work in this area and have the desire, we have a machine made from the navy, i talked to him. how did you get here. i really wanted to do it. he is one of our best. we have asked the navy to give us all of their machinist mates -- no, i'm kidding. there is great talent out there. the key part is how to keep them, incentivize them, and the programs that we are doing, working with the services on a program for that and seven of the correct career fields with the services to have. >> the concept would like you to talk about, if you want to, and

think about, if you haven't thought about it, is several senators from this committee and i along with others are looking at some legislation that would create more cyber warfare opportunities in the national guard. missouri has done some of this already, as i think you know. these are people who are actively in this work every day who would then be available to react or be available to train. is that a sense of how that might be part of what you're looking at in the future? >> senator, we have national guard folks on our staff. we're actively working with regard. a few weeks ago i sat down with all the generals from all the states and walked through how we could do this country and everybody to the same standard active in guard. their roles, 2-fold, to quickly summarize, one would be how they work with the state's, dhs, fbi

and resiliency in recovery in helping the investigative portion and other work with us and a cyber complex to complement what we're trying to do. to let have enough force. we will depend on reserve and national guard. >> and i think in this area that is, for instance, the machinist mate, if he or she decides for some reason that they don't want to be in the full time force but have this great skill level that they have acquired to take that to the guard. >> general. >> senator, if i just might pile into the conversation for a moment, i think it is important for us to remind ourselves that whether it is growth in cyber, whether its investment in replacement for the ohio class submarine, no matter which peace of the future that we're looking at here, all of this is sensitive to the budget decisions. the sequestration, for example, and as budget totals will, in fact an impact all of this. well general alexander is right,

there is some growth that is under way. at the service has been very generous in that regard. there will be impact across the board your. we just cannot predict what does look like today into the actual budgets are redone. >> general kehler, have you talked about the sequestration and the continuing resolution component of that? we had people in here over the last few days that have talked about how important it is. we update your spending requests and hopefully we are in the process of doing that. but would you visit with me a little bit about that. >> we would be in favor of as much certainty as we can put back into the process. that is a way to help with certain the. as i said earlier the most immediate impact for us in the most concerning and troubling impact in strategic command is the impact that we will see on our civilians.

significant. i think we need that to be very mindful of the potential damage that doesn't back to have. beyond that there are the impacts and readiness accounts that we will see. that is like a slow-motion movie. in so stratcom this will be like watching something in slow motion. it will occur and is happening now. we do not see the effect yet. we will see that affect as the months progress. >> says these things come together, the failure to update the perris refusing to appropriate and debate those bills on the floor has come together with the cutting of the old priorities on the line by line basis. >> general alexander. >> it impacts cyber command in a similar way. the continuing resolution holds a city fy2012 budget, but as you know we are standing up all these teams.

and one-third of our air for civilians. they're going to be impacted by this furlough. the folks here asking to do this tremendous job and we will now follow many of those. that is the wrong message to send people we want to say in the military. >> the impact of dividing your work force between the uniformed personnel and civilian personnel . the internal management challenge general alexander. >> it works well together. >> when the civilian force takes a furlough. >> it has a significant impact. they looked at it and see where we being targeted. it is a smaller group. when you look at it, both sides agree that this is the wrong way to handle it.

we need to give the service chiefs and military the ability to the look at where we take these and do it in a smart way. right now just doing it by activity does not make sense. we would not do it if we ran this industry. >> could not agree more. general kehler and i were at the air force base the other day, the commanding general there on this topic said the civilian force is an intricate part of what we do and we don't need to send a message to them that somehow they are not as intricate to what happens every day as the uniformed forces. they show very good management concern about how you keep your team together when the law is dividing your team and the part of your team. not suggesting, by the way, that we do anything he by force.

though of unintended consequences. all the personnel obligations. the role of our civilians has changed over the years that i've served. today they are integral to everything that we do. they are leaders in our organization. they occupy senior positions, and in many, many cases they represent the expertise that we do not have in the uniformed force. and so in a place like strategic command in a place like cyber command, and a place like the nuclear enterprise where our senior civilians really represent most of the experience that is left in these types of highly technical, highly complicated places. so certainly in the of our business we have some senior

civilians who are in very important parts of the department of defense base organizations. so i think it my concern with sequestration begins with the intentional and then the unintentional and tangible impact that we might see on our work force. the uncertainty that goes with that the concerns been the most. if i could just add one more thing. we have had a very successful intern program to try to entice young college graduates to become civil servants so that they can have government careers . it has been very successful. and so in omaha we find that a number of these youngsters who are just beginning their careers and civil service, college degrees, looking around today and wondering if this is their future. >> exactly. >> thank you, generals. >> senator donnelly. >> thank you, senator and generals. thank you for your service.

general alexander, does the private sector have the same skills that your team does in reacting to cyber security and to the reacting to a cyber attacks and being able to protect themselves? >> the private sector has some tremendous talent in this area which we need to leverage and partner with. i want to -- i think we need to be clear that there are two parts to answering this question accurately. when you look back at seven years ago to an enigma and you looked at the making and breaking of codes and doing some of the special work that the predecessors to nsa did, we have special capabilities, both in cyber command and an essay, hints that partnership. it gives us unique insights to vulnerabilities and other things that we can share back-and-forth and it is that area that is, perhaps the most important in

identifying those vulnerabilities and sharing them with industry that those things that could impact our industry. industry has skills and sees different things. the anti virus community is very good in this area, and i don't underestimate them. what you're actually doing is say let's put the best of those two teams together to the finance. that is one of the key things that we need to do. >> on look at what is going on, a huge amount of this is efforts to try to steal america's intellectual property from defense contractors, from private plans to shed businesses, military. if you are a business in you are developing products and you may be concerned by your ability to protect against a cyber attack, you know how to develop a great

product that may help cars run faster on less fuel, but cyber attacks are not your thing. if you are that company would you recommend in terms of protecting themselves? >> i would recommend that the first talk to companies that have great experience and can give great advice. the defense industrial advice also have companies that can do that. that takes them one step. the senator brought up a good point that needs to be brought in here. needs to be a layer of defense. a more resilient and protected architecture, and those things that they should do, like having norton anti virus in your home computer. >> short. >> those are the key things, and we can help them with that. there is another part. we know things about the network that now we will call classified information that would be useful for us to share to protect

those. we cannot do is share those so widely that the adversary as we know them were we lose that capability . that part of sharing has to be done properly in a classified form that those internet service providers and other companies can use to protect the networks which is why i say it is almost two layers. >> you had mentioned before, you talked about offense as well. our communications made to those countries, those organizations that have done cyber attacks against us, there are consequences in regard to what we can do as well. >> the president did make that statement publicly. a 2011. we responded to cyber attacks with all the broad range of options that he has before them. and i think that some companies have been talked to privately.

i cannot go into that here. i think that is the first logical step that we should take to say, if you do this it will upset us. that is why they don't have me do it every day at people who can put this in the right words, but we ought to have those. i know that the interagency process does work closely. >> general kehler, in regards to north korea and what we have seen in the past few weeks, at this point what adjustments to our posture are needed, if any, to make sure that not only our friends in south korea, but our own nation and our other allies are protected? >> senator, we are looking across our entire range of activities to see if any adjustments need to be made. what i would say is that deterring north korea from acting irrationally is our

number one priority, and that deterrence begins on the peninsula with our alliance. it extends to our conventional forces that are for work on the peninsula. extends to other forces that are available. it extends ultimately all the way back to our nuclear deterrent. today to my assessment of strategic commands role in this is that we are capable of offering to the president the full range of options. whenever he chooses to use in response to the north to reenact , i believe we can make available to him and i am confident in that today. we are looking at the pace of the north korean threat to see whether or not a limited missile defense that we have in place both in the theater and for the united states is on the right pathway to deal with the threat.

we are working now with the intelligence community to see if there is a more complete assessment we need to put in place today and whether that will cause us to make any adjustments. >> with some areas and some countries, you can determine what we expect them to do next. has number three of, you talked about rational actors. is it difficult at times to determine what they're going to do next and what steps it will take? >> i believe it is difficult. i believe that we all think that is difficult, especially with an new leader that, frankly, i think we are still getting to know. there are great debates about how all rational irrational except for. i think for us anyway it is a question about readiness. and us being ready to respond in

any way that might become appropriate. i am confident today that we can respond in appropriate ways. we participate in exercises with pacific command and with our command on the peninsula, as they are participating with the exercise series. and so i believe that we are demonstrating their credibility of our capabilities and that is important. >> do you see coordination between north korea and a run in the iranian effort to develop further technologies and in korea's efforts? >> i would prefer to have that conversation in a different setting. >> that's fine. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator donnelly. senator fisher is next. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you for being here today.

general, it is a pleasure to see you again. earlier you said that we can protect the continental united states with the resources that we currently have. is that correct? >> against a limited threat. >> against a limited threat. would you agree that that equation would rapidly changed if others would be able to develop technology to detect our submarines, if governments would become more hostile to us, and if we don't maintain the systems that we have? >> senator, i think that any time the threat changes that that certainly causes us to review and could cause us to make adjustments in all kinds of places. yes. >> are we addressing those concerns now? >> yes, we are. >> are we maintaining our nuclear arsenal to the standard

you would like to see? >> we are today. however, with a caveat, and that is that all along here over the last two years that i have been in command, we have made a point of agreeing forcefully with the need to the both modernize the deterrent and make sure that the enterprise is capable of sustaining it. so with those caveat is yes, i am comfortable that we are capable of maintaining a safe, secure, and effective deterrent. >> and with those caveats you can perform a mission that you are asked to do right now? >> yes. >> do you agree with this statement, the more usable weapons are the more deterrent value they have and the less likely there will be used? >> i would generally agree with that. i typically say the more credible deterrent is and that, of course, includes that we are

able to employ it if we were ever in this situation where the president asks for us to employ it. >> do you believe that our conventional forces today would be able to execute a deterrence mission that is currently performed by our nuclear weapons? producing a military he -- military result that would be similar to what the military weapon could do. the question about deterrent effect, i think, is an interesting one. in some cases yes i believe that strong conventional forces clearly improve and increase our overall deterrent to the images like a number of other factors do. but i believe that nuclear weapons continue to occupy a

unique place in our defense strategy and our national security quaff ending global perceptions that they continue to occupy any place. >> premier response i would assume bet you would agree that we need to maintain the balance that we currently have them with our nuclear deterrent and balance with our conventional forces to back a we had a good point? >> an interesting thing has happened. i believe that we are. they are complementary. and what has happened, i believe, since the cold war is that our increases in our conventional capabilities and in the sort of overwhelming conventional power projection that we can bring to bear around

the world has made a difference in the role of our nuclear deterrent. i think that we have been able to narrow the role of that nuclear deterrent accordingly. i think as we go forward that will be an interesting question to watch whether our conventional forces remain strong. >> at current levels you believe that it is a good balance, if those levels would drop with conventional forces or with nuclear. focusing on the conventional, if we see dead nuclear side drop, if we don't maintain the arsenal that we have now or if we continue to limit it to mike in the conventional forces pick up the slack? >> i think in some cases the answer is yes. i do not think they can across the board. add enough think that they substitute for the effect of the

nuclear deterrent. however, i do think that conventional forces to in fact make a difference in terms that we are no longer in a position where we have to threaten nuclear use in order to overcome a conventional deficiency. that has made a difference. i also think that we need to -- saying that they are in some kind of balance today does not mean in my view that there is not some opportunity to, perhaps, go below and start new levels. >> would you like to elaborate? >> i think there are still, as i said earlier, from my military perspective, i think that we have indeliberate past where we have been on with the russians over the years in reducing the number of weapons that can potentially threaten the united states or our allies and we have done that in a way that as

maintain stability in done in a way that has been verifiable, i think that has provided benefit to us from a military perspective. i think that there are additional opportunities in the future that we ought to explore. >> would you recommend it going both the new s.t.a.r.t. levels unilaterally? >> i would not. i would not. the formula for success has been that we have done this with the russians. i think that is the formula for continued success. i believe that certain -- the secretary, very -- i have seen some correspondence from the secretary where he has agreed with that. the president mentioned in his state of the union address that he wanted to work with the russians. i think that is a consistent theme that we have seen across the board. >> it has been suggested by opponents to our nuclear program

that the program is on a hair trigger. do you believe that there is any risk that is caused by our readiness posture right now? >> we go to extraordinary lengths to make sure that our nuclear deterrent force is both safe and secure. i believe that it is safe, and i believe it is secure. it is also under the positive control of the president of the united states. >> do you believe that it makes our country safer? >> i believe that in today's global environment that having a portion of our forces in a ready to use posture for the president meets our needs today. we are always reviewing at to see whether that is the appropriate balance for tomorrow or the day after.

i think that will very as the world situation changes. >> thank you. general alexander, if i could ask you a brief question. the defense authorization bill said that congress should be consulted about any changes to the use cp as it relates to cyber command. would you commit to providing this committee, this panel with justification for elevating to a u.s. cyber command? >> absolutely. i think right now the secretary and others are looking at that, and i know that the intent is to share everything with this committee before they take any action and make sure the committee is comfortable with any actions. right now is just in the discussion phases. the new secretary has to look at it, and i think that will take some time. then we will bring it back. >> thank you very much. thank you, mr. chair. >> thank you very much, senator

fisher. senator blumenthal is next. >> thank you for your service and extraordinary contribution to our defense readiness and our nation. and perhaps i could begin, general alexander, by asking you a general question which perplexes me. we agree, i think all of us on this committee agree with you that the threat of cyber attacks and cyber interference with key parts of our nation's infrastructure or private companies that are so vital to our national defense is a clear and present danger to our nation. and yet the nation as a whole seems unaware suddenly alarmed by this threat. and i know that you have thought a lot about these issues, spoken to us about them privately as well as publicly.

wonder if you have some suggestions for us as to how we or you or the president can make the nation more aware. obviously the president has spoken about them. i wonder whether you have some thoughts for us. i know it may seem as though it is in the political realm, but really in the educational task that i think we face together to make the country aware of the real threat physically and otherwise of cyber attacks. >> senator, thank you. what you bring out is key, i think, to really moving the legislation forward. educating people on the threat accurately educating them on the technical side, what this means dollars a cyber attack, and the effects, was going on, we are losing a we should do. there are many reasons that industry and other players are

concerned about legislation and other things. part of it is the cost, the bureaucracy that comes in. part of it is addressing a very complex issue that at times is easier to ignore. to that is theft of intellectual property. the fact that they lose it is an issue. for the country, for the nation as a whole this is our future. that intellectual property from an economic perspective represents future wealth, and we are losing some of that. >> and you have referred to it, i think, as the greatest single transfer or illegal transfer of wealth in the history of the world. >> yes. i agree. exactly. and i am concerned that if we don't stop it it will hurt our nation's significantly. there are two parts to stopping. one is fixing are in for structure, a working together with industry and government to stop these attacks. the second, as was brought out by mr. donnelly, perhaps our

administration and others reaching out to those countries in stopping it. i think the second part right now, we have to step back to the first part and look how we educate. i do believe that we have to be more public and some of this. and we have to diffuse the alarming stuff that comes out on civil liberties and privacy in have a candid set of discussions on what it means to protect cyberspace. i think that is often lost. often it is just thrown out there as a way of stopping progress when what will happen, what i am really concerned about is a significant event happening and then we rushed to legislation. we have the time now to think our way through and get this right. we should educate people and do that. we are pushing for the same thing and will help in any way we can. >> thank you. >> general alexander, if i may ask you, you have stated that it is essential to provide sufficient resources to replace our 0-class ballistic missile

submarines. as you are aware, the f white 2013 budget, defer procurement of the first ohio replacement boat by two years. and i would like to a -- i would like you to the share with the committee to the extent that she can other submarines are still required. assume that they are. how in general terms and requirements like this is established and what we're going to do to achieve that goal. >> senator, we established the requirements by looking into the future and making a number of judgments about the future. it's what we do with every weapon system that we put on the

books. in this case, though, i think we have started from to the assessment that the value of the submarine based deterrent as we go to the future will remain as high as it yesterday. and then the question does not become if you need to do it and in my mind but when. and so we have worked this very carefully with the navy. it is ultimately the navy's assessment of the current performance of the existing submarines and their longevity that is driving the answer to this question. much like any other military platform, the amount of use that gets put on it determine this lifetime. in the case of submarines, which i don't know much about, but a number of submariners who worked for me remind me constantly that it is the harsh environment.

then you get the pressure, pressure, reduced pressure. and so that does things to metallurgy. it does things to fittings and it does things to the internal workings of a submarine that ultimately cause them to question the continued safety of being able to cycle down and not. the navy tells us that we're going to reach that. it's not that we are a bright line in the sand that today they are lucky in tomorrow they're not. there is is on they will enter. and citing these an additional two years to the right puts them in the zone. it's not prudent for us decide them further. unless, of course the navy steps forward and says we can go another couple of years. i don't know that there will say that.

i think the issue would be 12 looks like the right number as we get to the future. that can always be adjusted as we go to the future. it seems to be the right balance between capability and cost. that is going to be important as we go to the future. a question about that. so on balance my view is that we do need to go forward with that. we need to go forward with a long-range strike aircraft as well, and we need to complete the analysis of alternatives on the future of the intercontinental ballistic missiles beyond 2030. it is not a decision we have to make today, but it is an analysis of alternatives as we go forward. >> there is no question right now that 12 is the right number. >> i don't have a question that that is -- i would say that is a minimum number that we sit there looking at today. i don't know if the number gets larger than that, and that will depend, i believe, number of factors as the go forward. >> and when you say that sliding to two years puts us in this zone, could you explain what you

mean? >> the first of the ohio class submarines will begin to reach the end of their service lives at just about the time the first of their replacement comes on line. it is a dance that we are working. by the way, we are working this with the united kingdom as well because they're looking to piggyback, if you welcome on this program for their own replacement. so this is a very delicate programmatic dance that the navy is doing with the u.k. as well as with the needs that stratcom is put on them. >> thank you. my time has expired. perhaps i can follow up with some questions and also to general alexander, if we can explore, perhaps, further the education of the public which is so vital to the work that you are doing and we are seeking to assist you. thank you very much. >> thank you, senator blumenthal senator sessions. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i think both of you for your

lead in the commands that you have, both of which are extremely important to america. the defense department acknowledges, general kehler, that russia is increasing its reliance on nuclear weapons and that the pace and scope of china's nuclear programs is defined as well as the strategy behind their plan raises questions about there future intentions and the number of weapons they intend to have. likewise india and pakistan are modernizing their nuclear forces . they commented that get their weapons are essential for france and, of course, north korea continues to expand its capability while allowing it to be on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons. so i am not aware of any country reducing the nuclear stockpile

except, perhaps, us as we continue to look at that. let me ask you, what are the strategic implications of these trends on enhance nuclear weapons around the world? >> senator, they do have implications. first of all, when we look at assessing other nuclear arsenals around the world, what we do is we look at intent and the ability. and i think none of us believe that the russians intend to attack the united states. i think we don't believe that the chinese intend to attack the united states. however, the capability to do so is there, and as long as it is we have an obligation to deter against such an attack which means we have to be mindful of the capabilities that they are bringing to bear. wind up their modernization, and we certainly know the numbers. and i think at least again from a military perspective arms

control and our productions have helped us in terms of limiting or reducing in some cases the threat that we face. we get to a point here, though, where, as we -- as we work toward a goal, the eventual goal is zero, to get to a point where other arsenals began to bear on this equation. >> i couldn't agree more about that. i think it is unimaginable that if we go to zero that every other country in the world would go to zero and that would place us that a strategic disadvantage of great magnitude. could the disparity in public vision of countries and their nuclear weapons, most of these i have mentioned more robust than the united states, could that

make our allies nervous? i am concerned about the discussions that we are having about further reducing our nuclear weapons that what those discussions might impact and might be having on our allies around the world like japan and south korea that have relied on the u.s. nuclear umbrella for the past seven decades. if our arsenal and therefore the nuclear umbrella we provide continues to shrink i am concerned that our partners will look to create their own. cajon the proliferation seems to me. as you may have seen, the sunday new york times reported that north korea's third nuclear test , some influential south koreans are now beginning to open the gulf for the south to develop its own nuclear arsenal. ..

>> two days before the vote on the s.t.a.r.t. treaty, president obama reaffirmed his commitment

to nuclear modernization, stating that nuclear modernization has investment for the long-term long term and that that is my commitment to the congress. my administration will pursue these programs and capabilities for as long as i am president. can you tell us where we are on the efforts to modernize our nuclear infrastructure and derby on pace to comply with a further commitment? >> sir, i can tell you that through this omission of the president's budget, with the exceptions of we talked about last year, the weapons part of the business that the program did not close, if you recall that from last year -- the 2013 budget continued the modernization efforts across the board. some were later than others, but continued the modernization

efforts. the budget turned into a cr. i don't know what the remainder of the year will bring to us in terms of this. we are trying to structure the 2014 piece. given the additional investment reductions that will come with sequestration. i cannot tell you today what looks like. i cannot tell you that it's not going to happen. i can't tell you what's going to happen yet. we don't have the budget on the hill that describes her position. >> do believe that we should follow through with the commitment that the president has? this is a reasonable posture of the united states? >> i believe this continues to be a wise investment on our

behalf. >> and the national defense authorization act, we have certain expectations of a nuclear security administration that manages nuclear weapons. and the nuclear weapons council with regard to the shaping and reviewing of any budget. through the council, we will have input into that. specifically our report said that we expect the nuclear weapons council not only certify that the budget as it is submitted to congress, but that the nuclear weapons council also take an active role in shaping and reviewing the nsa budget as it is prepared for submission to congress and negotiating with

the management of budget during the budget review process. on the budget council in which you sit on, are you taking an active role in shaping the budget proposal? i ask that because it seems to me that the department of energy, their role is much like that of the defense contractors. and the money that they spend on a,, do you feel good about where we are and are we on track to raise it up >> senator, i do feel good in

terms of insight and influence. it is not perfect. but i think that over the last year in particular, there has been ager mattock change between the department of defense and department of energy over visibility into the budget and influence in shaping a budget. it is not perfect. i think we are learning a lot about how we can get better at this. i think there is more to do and i have seen a tremendous change, and i think it is a tremendous positive change. >> that is great. i would note that my understanding is that the department of defense has not yet certified the budget unless we have some concerns about it. but it is at the omb level and going forward. i do think it is healthy but the defense department has real input into the production of the

budget for nuclear weapons. >> thank you, senator sessions. >> thank you, general kehler. the men and women who are assigned to this missile range facility are some of the best around. the capability to provide our exceptional. it is used to test the systems that will protect our country and allies from this. currently under construction, there is a facility that i am sure you are familiar with, which will enhance the capabilities. so if you have not visited this recently, i certainly encourage you to go out there and we would like to join you in that visit that you can chat with the great

teams that we have out there. also the contractor personnel keeps the whole place going. i would welcome your thoughts as we go forward in these economically constrained times. >> senator, i will do that. i can hear my staff volunteering to go visit out there. i can tell you that the entire pacific range complex have other range assets and extends and it is very important to the united states. >> i can expect your continued support for the construction that is happening. >> yes, you can. >> in earlier testimony, the

challenge that you are facing, i think you might have talked about this to process and analyze all of the data that the reconnaissance staff has provided. we want to be sure that the data is accurate. another is to how you're going to use that data. while this tremendous amount of information that you are getting. the limits with a number of analysts that you have, the limits of this can be effectively used. how do you solve this problem and find a balance when ensuring that we don't miss something big? >> well, let me start. then i will defer to my colleague on the left. over the last 10 years i think we have learned something in

southwest asia. it isn't about the collectors as much as it is about processing. the more processing power we have been able to throw out the collection to have the machines make sense out of what is being collected, the better we have gotten. it has provided great insight for forward forces to carry out missions and act in ways that i think the adversaries could not retract. the question and the trick is to extend that globally for all of our combatant commands as we look to the future. that is something that we're looking at as we speak. that is very important and i will refer this to keith. >> senator, i think one of the things, going back to put

together a gateway capability, and this is the processing power that general kehler talks about, i think that so they have the information that they need, a few things must be put on the table. first understanding what do they need to do their job. from the intelligence community perspective, that means our folks being in their environment, living in their environment and understanding what their needs are and having access to all the data that the collectors do. i think this committee and others and some of your staff have worked hard to ensure that what we have put their information into data storage that everyone can use. this is key to leveraging the power of our collectors. national and tactical to impact these requirements. we have made strides. i know that you have been to

hawaii and the facility there. i think some of the capabilities exist there in our folks would love to walk you through that. >> server, i take it that the research and development component is very critical and that we need to continue to provide resources for that. to enable you to do what you need to do with the massive data that you are needing to enter. >> i noticed that you had talked a little bit about recruiting and retaining their key personnel would be. i know that you want us to increase the education of our future leaders by fully integrating cyberinto our curriculum. you have noticed that this is further going into the operational arena for every

domain. this is an area that needs to be fully integrated and assimilated. what are your thoughts on how long this is going to take to make sure that this incorporates cyberand that cyber, to make sure that it is at the forefront of what all of our general should be thinking about. >> it should be absolutely the first thing that they learn. >> i attempt to share that view. this is a new area. we are very vulnerable on the cyberfront. >> we have people who carry this message forward. we are adding it into the curriculum. we are also working with the defense intelligence agency and setting up a midgrade course or field grade course that we have.

we also have a series of courses that we have for our folks and for our staffs, not just ours but all of them to understand sieber. the interesting part is that we will get that set up. but it's key to note that every day this area changes. so keeping on top of it, keeping those changes is what we really need to do. keeping people aware of the changes and the impact of those changes have. that is the key part. one of the great parts about having this is that we can leverage academic capabilities of an essay with a military working together to ensure that we have these courses that both of our civilian and military people go to. we have made great strides and we have a whole series of courses that we can show you and when i talk about things publicly, i give them insights to books that they should read.

as a younger officer, i didn't read all the books that people recommended. but there are great books that we recommend people read. >> are you satisfied that this assimilation is going on fast enough and that will continue very rapidly in this area? >> changing some of these courses takes time. those folks first have to operate in this area. i think that part is going well. we do have the staff level and we have made up for all the combatant commands. i will tell you that the chairman and others have had these discussions for all of us sitting around a table to talk about this in a classified environment so everyone understands the threat of that. we do understand that. >> you noted this is an area

that changes rapidly. can you talk about how we would measure effectiveness in your efforts and what kind of an effort would you use to determine whether we are on the right track or not? >> okay, there are two parts to measuring up. one is certifying individuals and we are developing a certification program. so we would have to be certified to operate. that's one part. the other is looking at what we see in going through our cyberreadiness to see where each of our commands in the military are in the networks. what we have seen in the constant improvement in the cyberreadiness of those networks. it's not perfect, but it's growing and getting better.

>> you testified about how important collaboration is with the private sector. can you talk a little bit about what you see as the collaboration? are we talking about collaborating on technology? and that the private sector would need liability. can you talk about why the private sector needs liability protection? >> the key things that we need in sharing information and the ability for those to understand the threats that we are seeing and what they are saying in their networks. they will be looking at different portions of our networks. so together we see more if we put the two facts together and

we put them three more defensible architecture. those threats could be malicious software to capabilities. the second part is what you do to fix the networks and make them more defensible. industry and government have some great ideas and implementing them is. for example, it gives us a more defensible architecture because it allows us to see threads better than we have ever been able to in the past. it is those kinds of things that we are working on. when we share some of this information with industries, the liabilities that they incur, it is significant.

from my perspective, when we are asking them to do something and then they bear the brunt of the lawsuit, it is not right. we ought to give them the authority to share their information with the government, which they don't have today. >> thank you, i apologize for going over my time. thank you so much, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator. we will put these blue notes a little bit closer. i'm sure that our colleagues understand it. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, general kehler and general alexander for joining us and your service to our country. in june of 2010, as the senate was considering the new s.t.a.r.t. treaty, your predecessor testified before the

senate foreign relations committee that it is exactly what is needed today to provide a deterrent. but i understand your answer to senator fisher's question as being inconsistent with that? i think i did. i thought i heard you said that we could go lower than that. what has changed between now and then? >> senator, i think that i am not inconsistent with that. let me explain. what we start with is a set of national security objectives and those objectives eventually wind up being military tasks.

which require a certain number of weapons to achieve. he took a look at the national objectives that he had the time and he looked at the number of weapons that were going to be permissible and he said that all of those match. my point is that we may have opportunities to go below that, but it doesn't start with the number. it has to start with military tactics associated with. >> you're not saying that as of right now you are certain or confident we could go below that? you are saying it is possible based on further assessment at some point? >> yes, sir, i think that is right. based upon national objectives and the military tactics that we would be asked to achieve and the nature of any threat that is out there. i think many factors go into my

intentions. i support this and we should explore whether this is possible or not. >> one of the reasons i was surprisingly say that is that in light of the ambitious modernization program that we have going on in russia and also china and in light of getting other countries like north korea and iran aggressive nuclear ambitions, the risk and threat would be a condition that needs to be considered. >> death, primarily, the arsenal that we have that was built during the cold war, it represents the vast majority of the weapons that exist.

>> there are a lot of countries that rely on the nuclear arsenal. >> most definitely. >> so that umbrella, if you will, it extends over a number of allies. some of which are in close proximity to countries like iran and north korea. what consequence do you think it might have if we diminish our nuclear forces even further? what impact might that have for those who rely on our own nuclear capabilities to protect them. could that bring about additional nuclear proliferation >> i think we would have to be mindful that as we go forward and i that it should be one of the factors considered.

>> the think that countries like saudi arabia, turkey, maybe other nations might feel compelled to develop nuclear weapons in the near-term future? for example, when iran is able to achieve status as a nuclear power? >> there has been some reports that some countries would consider it. i don't have a good feeling from my position about what the official view is of that. but i think that anytime that we are talking about extending our nuclear guarantee, which is what we have done for many years, but what the allies have told us, that it concerns them is the consider making changes. i think we need to be mindful of those improvements.

>> correct. that probably means that we ought to be, you know, cautious before reducing our nuclear arsenal. and we should also be using our weapons system. it seems to me that especially as we have states like iran and north korea moving in that direction, that inevitably will have a huge impact on what other countries do. and that will most likely put more of a burden on us. and also further strain our ability. >> ultimately our ability to deter and assure our allies with that is based on the credibility

certainly over the last decade now, the presence and capability of our conventional capabilities has made a difference. i think in some cases, it has set a different context for the way we view our nuclear forces, but they still remain critical. >> what can you tell me about the chinese nuclear arsenal and whether you believe china will continue to increase the number of weapons whether it will try to seek equivalency in terms of the united states and russia. >> i think we need to have a more full conversation in a different setting than that we

watched china to continue modernizing portions of the forest. in terms of numbers, i believe those bad can state that, i tend to believe it is in the range we can talk about there must be some kind of numeric parity with the united states or russia this is why we want more transparency with china. we would like to be able to expand our dialogue with them so we can prevent it. >> thank you very much, general >> i certainly want to associate

myself with senator lee. we have to look at the world we live in when we make these decisions. we have been on the committee. [inaudible] are we spending enough money to modernize or nuclear weapons for his? >> i think we are coming out of a time when the answer was no. as mentioned earlier, which will come about over eight period of months, that was described as earlier as a impact of strack o.

>> part two of this is the overall budget totals which are coming down. now you have sequestration and would you agree? >> i'm not sure what the investment impact is going to be. i don't know. the budget details -- certainly if the rules say the way our across-the-board. >> assuming that across-the-board continuation

over a ten-year period of time, what would it do? >> general alexander, why isn't an attack. >> [inaudible question] >> that is a great question. what constitutes an act of war in cyberspace? >> there is no clear answer. i agree with you. essentially espionage and things that are not an act inactive or. >> without military modernization plans?

>> i think the intent is to steal secrets. if the intent is to disrupt or destroy it or infrastructure, we have crossed the lines. >> i can give you more details. >> all right. now, let's talk about outside the department of defense.

>> and systems go down, power systems, it affects you if financial services are disrupted, it would affect you. you can just go on and on with how it will affect our national security. >> i have talked to senator whitehouse in the past and found that he and i are essentially in these discussions. >> financial services, and if they went down, it would hurt our economy. i think the concept is that it allows the industry in question, like utilities come in to come up with best business practices within the industry and submit

their proposal to the government agency with homeland security and a key component of it. and if these are meaningful, we will grant liability protection to those who have met the standards. is that a reasonable way to proceed? >> the issue is the information sharing part. >> that is a critical part of it. let's assume that we get the information sharing right. the regulatory regime, my belief is that regulations are moving too fast. >> i do. if you separate the two and you have information on one side and

those that work together, in essence, that is where the executive orders try to go as well. >> yes, i would like to encourage that we can find a path forward that would allow the private sector to have the critical infrastructure area. because this is an ever-changing threat. finally, what kind of damage could be done to our country through a cyberattack? and we'll start with nationstates and criminal organizations. what kind of threat are we facing? finally in south carolina, our database at the department of revenue was hacked into. every citizen social security number and business information was stolen, causing the state of south carolina live production for citizens.

can you just quickly tell the committee the kind of threats that we face and if congress doesn't get involved, i think we will regret it. >> a power systems, our water systems, computerized switches, all of them are at risk. they could essentially destroy those components and make those so they either had to replace them or get somebody to come in and replace each part of that. >> it could do as much more damage than the attacks of 9/11? >> yes, i think it would. if you look at what happened in the northeast power disruption, that was caused by a software failure.

breaking some of the transformers, which would be very difficult to replace. we did have significant power outages for extended portions of the country. think about wall street. we were to go when senator blumenthal was asking questions would've you attacked wall street and the data is destroyed at the end of the day that ensures all the books are right. you have a significant problem. >> since our time is up, if you could just submit to the committee worst-case scenario, kind of a 9/11 scenario and the executive order is a result of congresses in action. i don't blame the president at all. you believe it would be prudent that we need legislation beyond

executive order? >> i do. >> thank you. to we are expecting senator back at any minute. we will then turn it over to senator. >> in response to senator graham, he's talking about what will happen with sequestration. of course, it would be damaging. in my opinion, it is a cut across the board. i didn't think sequestration would happen, but to take this as to how it will affect the whole division of bureaucracy and then say in the case of you

and taking that and hearing to that make those decisions, would that be better? many said yes, it would make a world of difference. would you agree with that? >> yes, sir, i would. >> would you agree with that? >> yes, sir, i would. >> thank you. >> thank you. general kehler, but like to focus on some of your testimony to grab my attention. the opening comment that you made and that you repeated verbally today is uncertainty and complexity dominate the national security landscape. i agree with that. i want to wrestle with questions that many of the colleagues have asked about fiscal uncertainty. we cannot necessarily reduce the uncertainty in the broader

world. but it is in our power to try to reduce some of the fiscal uncertainty that we are dealing with. the first day after this kuester went into effect, i visited the pentagon and spoke with secretary chuck cable and chuck schumer and and then i talked to the people an cafeteria and went table to table. just in the random three tables, i got active duty, veterans that were having dinner with friends, dod contractors and civilians, and some representatives were there for a planning meeting, and they were sharing their concerns about kuester and the overall climate of uncertainty as it affects them. and it sends a message.

what effect that i think has really dawn on me, its effect on personnel. fiscal uncertainty presents are people with an unprecedented combination of professional and personal concerns as well. the civilian team has performed beyond our greatest expectations and is the envy of the world. some of the people are questioning their future. the uncertainty surrounding the possibility of unpaid furlough's is troubling. much of the essential work which supports our mission that sustains our critical platforms.

of these come in, the most urgent investment is increasing the numbers, training and readiness of our cyberforces. it is about personal and it strikes me. i would imagine these professionals can be pretty intense. the second is a fiscal uncertainty that people would have if they chose the path of public service and what were they face in terms of furloughs

and what is the commitment that they would have? how would you deal with the recurring and retention in this environment and when you not only have a global uncertainty, but top economic competitors in the private sector and fiscal uncertainty as well. >> i would only add a couple of remarks. number one, we have the most magnificent people anywhere. they are the envy of every other military in the world. there like that for a reason. they are very patriotic. i don't worry about them other than to make sure that i can do everything possible to take care of them and make sure that they are going to be there and we will take care of them and their families. i think that as we look through the future, what i am hearing from some of our folks is

particularly troubling and it gets back to uncertainty. of course, we all of the economy to get better. we would like it to be better soon. as fast as it can possibly be. as that happens, the competition for the best and brightest is going to go out. in that environment, i am concerned that when they are weighing the financial certainty for their families, that they will come down on a different side. >> i think that that is an important question for us. we have an all volunteer military. so i think that we need to be mindful of this because we are competing for the best and brightest and we have been getting it. i believe again, there are magnificent people that raise their right hand and it doesn't

seem to much matter. they are all working hard to do the right thing. >> it is preserving mountain there is an impact with what is going on. >> can you comment additionally? >> i agree with everything that you read. i think it is 100% on track. we are impacted in two areas. it impacts our ability to treat more than we need to do that to get this stood out. by singling out the civilian work force, we have done a grave injustice. we are trying to get people to come in and support us. people are wanting to come in and work with us. now they are saying, did i make the wrong decision? i already took a salary

deduction to come to work for you. i think it is a great thing for our nation. but if this is going to be how it is, i cannot afford to do this to my family. that is a big impact and we shouldn't do that. >> let me they just move to a related area. that is trying to pass the right kind of balance. a lot of it is a dialogue between policymakers and the private sector and they have legitimate concerns. in your own experience, has the private sector expressed those concerns in the right way? has it been don't do this or that to us, or have they been -- have they been offering ways that we can accomplish to grow in a productive way? if the answer is no, that could be something that we could help with to try to smoke out the positives and including how to balance out these important

considerations. >> i think the big problem is every sector approaches it differently. what you get is 18 or 20 different groups of use on cyberlegislation. what we need, how we need to direct it. i think the executive order, i think that getting industry to sit down with government officials, putting the director in charge, start talking with the industry on the best way sector by sector and bringing that back up to the administration to you all. aim here is what we think the weight work with industry to help make the networks more resilient. what would you will find is that each part of our industry sectors are at different states of cyberreadiness, if you will. that is the real problem that we face. i've talked to lots of the io is. you get from one side to the

other. some of them really need help, they want help, are concerned about regulation. some of them don't and are concerned about the help we are going to give them. i think what we have to do is address each of those concerns and do it in a fair and equitable way. i think it's a great step in the right direction. >> thank you. >> thank you both very much. >> is there no other questions, we would just like to thank you both. you are a great service to our country. great testimony. thoughtful and considerate and we are very appreciative of it. we will stand adjourned. [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> the house budget committee will work on a republican plan for the 2014 budget. the committee will vote on amendments offered by committee

members. live coverage will start tomorrow at 1030 eastern on c-span3. >> coming up on c-span2, state health care exchanges and federal spending. then senate debate on federal government for the rest of the year. and david cameron testifies before the british liaison committee. >> i think what dolly madison has offered us as a model for government. one that is for stability and empathy. we look to this because we need examples and role models. her way of conducting politics is a model to use in the future. >> conversation on historians with dolly madison is now

available on c-span.org, our website,/first ladies. >> up next, a conversation on state health care exchanges and federal spending. from tuesday's "washington journal", this is 40 minutes. >> we are back with our reporter from political. we are here to talk about the affordable care act. it said that we want states to set up health care exchanges and what are they? >> they are the vehicle that millions of americans expect to get coverage under the the affordable care act. there are two ways. medicaid expansion and exchanges. exchanges will be run in every state. essentially they are a web portal or clearinghouse. consumers can get private insurance that is subsidized through the oral care act. it is for people who can't afford insurance or those who get it through their employer.

they would now have access to these exchanges. >> what type of insurance companies will participate? >> it will vary state by state. some have a more competitive process, some will bid against each other for access to the market. some will be more positive and say that any companies can come on and end we will give consumers the maximum choice possible in hopes that their competition drives down cost. >> this divide where states have politically resisted the affordable care act, they are actually saying that we don't want these exchanges. the federal government can come in and build their own exchanges and they will be controlled from washington with some state employed. >> 17 states and washington dc will establish us.

and 26 states likely to fall to the federal exchange. so can you explain the difference between a state-based exchange and the federal exchange? >> consumers may not see much of a difference, but i think the reason washington and the obama administration once the states to build their own is because they want states to have a stake in the outcome here. states often no insurance markets, the players, regulating things for years. so i think the obama administration wants to set up their own. >> so those that are pursuing a partnerships, how they were? >> that is a good question. it is going to differ among the partnerships. the states will control certain aspects of plant management and customer service. the obama administration is in

charge of the i.t. network required for all that. >> how will this affect cost were states on average? >> it is unclear. there is money and they forgo care act for that. some of that is impacted by sequestration. everyone is convinced that the obama administration will make sure that there is money to set off the exchanges, regardless of the impact of sequestration. >> where are we in the process? sequestration is happening now. but as far as one exchanges have to be set up, there have been several deadlines that have been put in place. >> some are several months away. but in terms of the forgo care act, it turns exchanges need to be running october 1, in order to be in compliance. there are a lot of questions as whether they will be ready in time to get those complex i.t.

networks in place in time and whether states that have held out for for where they want to do will have enough time. >> any chance they will be able to get some sort of delay or exemption from the federal government? >> they haven't had explicit acceptance, but they have been flexible. i think there is a chance that there could be a minor delay or some sort of way to get the state going as quickly as possible. >> we will be enrolled in receiving private plans, while contracted, getting these changes for people to enroll in. and we will still get a good sense unworthy of horrible characters working as intended,

hopeful of materializing. >> what are republicans saying that will be the outcome of these health care exchanges? >> you are seeing the critics and the republican states for the most part. saying this is an attempt for washington to control the health care market. the concerns that they will end up driving cost of her people. this is a sort of backdoor into control into these markets. >> driving up costs for people, how so? >> essentially, the co-pay amounts, the benefit amount,.

>> premiums could be going on. is that related to the conversation on health care exchanges? >> we will see how they drive up premiums. >> the we know the demographics of people who are likely to participate in these exchanges? they want to get young people to buy in.

even states,. >> many people consider themselves healthy, young invincible, they don't require immediate medical attention. the point is to get these people to buy into insurance now as a way to moderate health care costs are everyone else. the population does need regular care and regular treatment. >> so the forgo care act and health care exchanges, the 26 states, most of those republican governors that have made that decision, what do you think? >> they are almost exclusively. there are some states where you have democratic governors in the

legislatures were a state like new hampshire, with and now you have the support of a democratic governor. so for the most part, republican leaning states are taking part in this. >> we are talking about the state health care, federal health care exchange required under the affordable care act. patricia, you are up first. >> caller: yes, hello, paul ryan just did a budget and he wants to cancel the affordable care act. also, my government doesn't want it. i'm guessing the congress and give the money for the affordable care act.

>> okay, paul ryan's budget is being unveiled today. what do you say about this? >> well, his budget does assume the repeal of the affordable care act. i think it is sort of a pipe dream, given the political makeup of the country right now. i think it is aspirational. they would like that to be the case. republicans still think the forgo care act could collapse under its own weight. premiums will go up, people won't sign up, things like that. they think that there is no other choice and it could be a reality someday. >> at the kaiser family foundation's website they have a map on the exchanges and the decisions made by each of the

states. paul ryan, a republican is unveiling his budget to the federal exchange program. >> exactly. although governor walker, very interestingly, he unveiled a plan. the other mechanism is medicaid expansion. i don't want to expand medicaid through the affordable care act. but i do want as many people as possible to enroll in the exchange. but only to our lowest income residents. ..